The present invention relates to a new and improved construction of a communications system and, in particular, to an installation containing such communications system for the control operation thereof. The invention further pertains to a control system for a travelling tender movable along a predeterminate path of travel and to a method of controlling an installation having a number of work stations and a tender.
In its more specific aspects, the present invention relates to the automation of an installation, such as a machine or a plant which has a number of material-processing stations and at least one servicing unit or tender and controllable drive units for producing relative movement between the tender and the material-processing stations. As a rule, the tender is a travelling tender and the material-processing stations remain in predetermined positions. However, the converse arrangement, move past a stationary servicing unit or tender, also falls under this invention.
The invention is of use more particularly for arrangements in which the material-processing stations are disposed close beside one another, for example, in at least one row. The embodiments set out as examples hereinafter relate solely to the automation of textile machinery such as, for example, spinning, winding, doubling, false twisting, texturing and similar machinery (and plants consisting thereof), but the invention is not limited to this particular area of use. The term "installation" is thus generally used broadly hereinafter to encompass machines and/or plants.
Large computers for data processing and process control have been in use in industry since as early as the end of the 1950's or the beginning of the 1960's (see for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,045,210, granted July 17, 1962 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,582,621, granted June 1, 1971). Endeavors were simultaneously being made to control the movements of a travelling servicing unit or tender for a textile machine or a textile machinery plant from a central control station, (see for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,070,320, granted Dec. 25, 1962, U.S. Pat. No. 3,067,962, granted Dec. 11, 1962 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,300,959, granted Jan. 31, 1967) but without using the elaborate contemporary computer technology.
Up to the end of the 1960's and/or the beginning of the 1970's, various suggestions were made to use data processing and process control technology in connection with machine tools and textile machinery, see, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,638,191, granted Jan. 25, 1972, U.S. Pat. No. 3,430,426, granted Mar. 4, 1969, U.S. Pat. No. 3,648,026, granted Mar. 7, 1972, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,648,027, granted Mar. 7, 1972, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,798,624, granted Mar. 19, 1974. The suggestions included the control of a servicing tender, see, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,824,558, granted July 16, 1974, U.S. Pat. No. 3,680,297, granted Aug. 1, 1972, U.S. Pat. No. 3,680,298, granted Aug. 1, 1972 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,680,299, granted Aug. 1, 1972, the latter suggestions having been modified by the subsequently published U.S. Pat. No. 4,425,754, granted Jan. 17, 1984. These suggestions went as far as centralized control of a complete spinning works (U.S. Pat. No. 3,922,642, granted Nov. 25, 1975).
However, despite these possibilities for centralized control, the usable travelling tenders were devised to react to relatively simple signal transmitters (indicating lamps) in the various stations, (see, for example, British Pat. No. 1,103,267, published Feb. 14, 1968 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,810,352, granted May 14, 1974. It was suggested that a computer should control the movements of a tender in the complete installation while working on the various machines which had to be controlled conventionally (German Published Patent Application No. 2,460,375, published June 24, 1976). At about the same time, (U.S. Pat. No. 3,950,926, granted Apr. 20, 1976 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,043,106, granted Aug. 23, 1977), it was suggested that information be transmitted without mechanical contact from discrete spinning stations to a travelling automatic tender.
Suggestions for providing the travelling tender itself with data-processing facilities can be found in patent literature from the start of the 1970's (see for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,789,595, granted Feb. 5, 1974, U.S. Pat. No. 3,908,347, granted Sept. 30, 1975 U.S. Pat. No. 4,005,392, granted Jan. 25, 1977 and Japanese Pat. No. 50-20042, dated June 28, 1973. Towards the end of the 1970's, there were proposals for collecting data at the various stations for subsequent transmission to the tender (see for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,136,511, granted Jan. 30, 1979, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,137,699, granted Feb. 6, 1979). In the early 1980's, microprocessors have been coming into use to organize data flow within the machines (see for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,294,065, granted Oct. 13, 1981 and German Pat. No. 3,005,746, published Aug. 27, 1981).
Various suggestions have been made from time to time to use available data to optimize various procedures and two of the more recent variants on this theme can be found in European Published Patent Application No. 47,723, published Mar. 17, 1982, and European Published Patent Application No. 90,911, published Oct. 12, 1983.
Communications connections between the various elements of the system are of decisive importance for the success of the various suggestions. However, this aspect has been given relatively little attention in the patent literature. The transmission of information without mechanical contact has been mentioned in various places, see more particularly, U.S. Pat. No. 4,137,699, granted Feb. 6, 1979 (transmission from a spinning station to the travelling automatic tender) and German Published Patent Application No. 3,135,333, published Mar. 24, 1983, (transmission from a central control station to the automatic tender), but the transmission is usually by way of conductors, see German Published Patent Application No. 3,303,733, published Aug. 9, 1984, German Published Patent Application No. 3,332,899, published Mar. 28, 1985, German Published Patent Application No. 3,510,521, published Oct. 2, 1986, U.S. Pat. No. 4,340,187, granted July 20, 1982 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,475,331, granted Oct. 9, 1984 where a wired connection is regarded as more advantageous than a connection without mechanical contact.
A second aspect which has attracted even less attention is the integration of all the information-carrying elements in a total or complete system. However, the possibilities of integration determine the practical limits for optimizing the system.